Sunday, December 29, 2019

Let The Good Times Roll


The Del Counts

Let The Good Times Roll

Soma Record Co. 1430
1965

The Del Counts were started by Charles Schoen, who was inspired to start a career in music after learning to play the guitar while he recovered from a serious injury.  He named the band after his first drummer, Del Leon LaFave. "We were called the Del Counts from the start," Schoen said. "Del counted the songs — funny how that came about."  
 
Soon, Tony Preese replaced LaFave on drums Bill Soley played bass and Tom Aspenwall was the guitarist..

The band’s breakout song, “Let the Good Times Roll,” was released in 1965 and caught the attention of listeners. When the song was first released, it became an cue for local gangs to start brawling on the dance floor when the chorus began. The band realized that they may need to hide behind their equipment while performing the song to avoid injury.

In 2019, Governor Tim Walz has declared Friday, April 26, Del Counts Band Day, as the band celebrate with a 58th anniversary show. The Del Counts, who have been performing since 1961 and are widely considered the longest-running rock group in the state, continue to play shows decades later to nostalgic followers.


Wednesday, December 25, 2019

Sonya and the Avons sing for Riceland Rice


Sonya and the Avons
sing for
Riceland Rice

Pressed by Southern ¨Plastics in Nashville in 1964. A promotional record for Riceland, a company founded in 1921 with headquarters in Stuttgart, Arkansas.

Produced by Noble-Dury, a nationally known advertising and public relations firm. Noble-Dury reigned supreme for a 30-year period that spanned from the 1940s to the mid-1970s. The agency is widely regarded as the most successful ad firm in Nashville’s business history, and for a time, it even ranked as the largest agency in the Southeast. Noble-Dury represented leading national and regional consumer brands, as well as banks and insurance companies, but the firm’s reputation and fortunes largely hinged on relationships with Kentucky Fried Chicken and Pizza Hut.

Les Beasley (of The Florida Boys gospel group) and Jan Doughten (or Jane Dowden?), vice president of Noble Dury, developed and co-produced the television show Gospel Singing Jubilee, an hour-long television program hosted by the Florida Boys that featured a number of other Southern gospel groups as guests.  The Gospel Singing Jubilee, which became the most watched gospel program on television, began in 1964 on a Sunday morning . The show ran for twenty-five years.

Backing Sonya, the lead singer, are certainly The Avons, whose first taste of the studio was an initial one-off hire for budget label Hit, providing uncredited backing vocals to Peggy Gaines’ cover of The Marvelettes’ “Playboy” (Hit 17).  Much more info on The Avons by E. Mark Windle here

I'm fairly confident that this is the same Sonya of Sonya & the Capris on Scarlet (1959) and Sonya (alone) on Dot (two singles in 1961 and 1962 and also (why not?) Sonya And The Sensations (Dont Feel Like The Lone Ranger) On Gend (1963)
 
May the new year bring me some info about the mysterious Sonya and (am I asking too much?) a picture of her...

Riceland Rice ad from 1965


Monday, December 23, 2019

Hey Little Girl


Tommy Moore

Hey Little Girl
Tommy Moore, Tweety Music & Skyrocket Music (BMI)

A Kelly Owens Production
Distributed nationally by Stroll Records
201 W. 49th St. - CO 5-9693

My Brother's Record Co.
Record No.103 C-O

Tweety Music
was owned by Kelly Owens. According to a mickey rat comment , active & always informative 45cat member :
I'm pretty sure Kayo was owned by Kelly Owens and affiliated with his Tweety Music publishing firm. Kelly Owens was a very busy pianist/arranger in New York in the 1950s and early '60s and was involved with countless R&B and pop sessions for Savoy, DeLuxe/King and Morty Craft's various labels, often in collaboration with producer Fred Mendelsohn. He was also part-composer of numerous songs, notably Elvis's "I Beg Of You" with Rose Marie McCoy. Earlier Kayo releases were distributed by Lou Krefetz's Poplar Records, but by this stage Morty Craft's United Telefilm was doing the job.
Skyrocket Music was owned by Bennie (or Benny) Clark. His full name was Benjamin Franklin Clark, a much obscure player on the New-York musical scene in the late fifties/early sixties.

Related labels:
https://www.45cat.com/label/kayo
https://www.45cat.com/label/my-brothers
https://www.45cat.com/label/stroll
https://www.45cat.com/label/fountainhead
https://www.45cat.com/label/skyrocket-us

For the record, the coat of arms found on the label is also seen on Kayo 101 (The Regents), Fountainhead 105 (Bobby Long), Sky-Rocket 107 (Danny Robinson) and Stroll 109 (Duke & The Ambers). This is (my own research) the coat of arms of...Venezuela.



According to Wikipedia :
The shield is divided in the colors of the national flag. In the dexter chief, on a red field, wheat represents the union of the 20 states of the Republic existing at the time and the wealth of the nation. In sinister chief, on a yellow field, weapons (a sword, a sabre and three lances) and two national flags are tied by a branch of laurel, as a symbol of triumph in war. In base, on a deep blue field, a wild white horse (perhaps representing Simón Bolívar's white horse Palomo) runs free, an emblem of independence and freedom.

Above the shield are two crossed cornucopias (horns of plenty), pouring out wealth. The shield is flanked by an olive branch and another of palm, both tied at the bottom of the coat with a large band that represents the national tricolour (yellow for the nation's wealth, blue for the ocean separating Venezuela from Spain, and red for the blood and courage of the people).
But after all, this surprising borrowing (probably an idea from Mr Clark) is not that intriguing, as his Stroll label also had as well a stroller copied probably from some New York cartoonist and a fountainhead on his Fountainhead label copied from an old 78 rpm from the Fountainhead Record Company

I've not been able to find any info of this Benny Clark (another and later Benny Clark musician is/was from Buffalo, New York).

There was a Bennie Clark who was the elevator operator at Ziegfeld's New Amsterdam Theatre, a Broadway theatre located at 214 West 42nd Street between Seventh and Eighth Avenues in the Theater District of Manhattan.  This Bennie Clark had been running the car for years, and he knew all the girls [of Ziegfeld].  Perhaps this is the same Bennie Clark? Perhaps he saw once (and liked it) the coat of arms on the door of the Consulate-General of Venezuela in New York City (located today at East 51st Street)?

Anyway, are you still there?, the song on flip is "You've Got To Reap What You Sow"




Saturday, December 21, 2019

Call Me Skinny


Jim Climer

Call Me Skinny

Rolando 45-202
Produced by Roland Janes
Late sixties?

Memphis (or West Memphis, Arkansas?) artist and radio personality (on KWAM), Jim Climer had two records issued in 1962 : on the Kris label, Little Twister/On Top Of Old Smokey and on Fernwood : Tall Mack The Lumberjack/he Clown With A Broken Heart.  According to Wayne Jackson, trumpetist with The Mar-Keys, Jim billed himself in these days as "Jim Climer, Ninety Pounds of Rock and Roll".

A friend of Eddie Bond, he co-wrote with him a song entitled "Ballad of Buford Pusser." 


Wednesday, December 18, 2019

Mansion On The Hill


Killer Warren Waid
and his Musical Saw


Mansion On The Hill

RM 42981

For the musical saw enthusiasts there is a dedicated website :  https://sawnotes.com/ 



Among the famous people who played the musical saw, there was — I didn't known that — German movie star Marlene Dietrich. According to arts in exile
Marlene Dietrich was taught to play on the musical saw during shooting in summer 1927 by her fellow actor Igo Sym, who gave her the instrument as a farewell gift. She took the saw with her to Hollywood and astonished directors and crew with her playing on the set of at least six films. But the musical saw was never used in any of her films. It was only during her engagement entertaining US troops in 1944/45 that Marlene Dietrich performed with the instrument. There were roars of enthusiasm whenever she hitched her skirts to play on the saw for hundreds of soldiers on a stage improvised from the loading areas of two trucks. Some of her performances with the musical saw were also broadcast on American radio, e.g. in Milton Berle’s road show Let Yourself Go on 20 June 1944.
Today, the real modern musician (like Jackyl) uses the chainsaw :







Acknowledgments: Scott Rogers (YouTube) and Jackyl (YouTube also)

Sunday, December 15, 2019

Let's Hide Away and Dance Away

(strictyl instrumental)

King 773

One of the best guitar instrumental albums by one of my favorite guitarist, Mr. Freddy King!
Twelve tracks recorded in Cincinnati in August 1960, April 1961 and July 1961.

01 - Hide Away
02 - Butterscotch  (aka Onion Ring)
03 - Sen-Sa-Shun  (aka Bumble Bee Sting)
04 - Side Tracked 
05 - The Stumble  
06 - Wash Out     
07 - San-Ho-Zay   
08 - Just Pickin' 
09 - Heads Up     
10 - In the Open  
11 - Out Front    
12 - Swooshy
Ripped from the King CD 773.(Made In Canada)
 

Friday, December 13, 2019

Hootchy--Koo


Wayne Tursso
and Tim's Galaxies Orch.

Twayne T-100 (PE-802)
1963


Hootchy--Koo


Playing For Keeps

Two covers (Larry Williams & Elvis Presley).  "Playing For Keeps" penned by Stan Kesler was first recorded as a demo for Elvis by Barbara Pitman.



Wayne Tursso (1938-2016)

Wayne Charles Tursso was born in St. Paul, MN, on September 18, 1939. He grew up and received his education in South St. Paul, MN, and later attended Brown Institute, in Minneapolis, MN.

From May of 1962 until February of 1965, Wayne served in the US Army. After his discharge, he lived in Minneapolis, Des Moines, IA, and Detroit Lakes, MN, before coming to Fargo, ND. He worked at several radio stations and sold insurance for AAA and Prudential. He worked in sales and circulation for the Fargo Forum, until he retired in 2014.

In 2015, Wayne became a resident of Golden Living Center, Moorhead, MN, where he died on November 2, 2016, at the age of 77.





Sunday, December 8, 2019

I'm Coming Down Mama




Aaron Love
is an Arkansas singer and drummer whose nickname is the Jonesboro Blues Man. He returns yearly to the Blues Fest held in his hometown of Jonesboro, AR, to attend the reunion of Alley Records recording artists. "I'm Coming Down Mama," an Alley Records release, was a local hit for Love.

Some info here


Saturday, December 7, 2019

Mack The Knife


From The Gone Records LP "Willie Restum At The Dream Lounge"
1959

Willie Restum, Allentown's irrepressibly effervescent baritone saxophonist and lounge entertainer died in Los Angeles from a stroke in 2006 . He was 76.

Dressed in his trademark outfit of black Clark desert boots, black socks, Bermuda shorts and loose, loud shirt with kangaroo pouches, the well-known entertainer performed at venues from the Allentown Fair to the Dream Lounge in Miami Beach to the Playboy Club in Hollywood. Mixing stardust standards, Arabic dance numbers and jokes of all stripes, he shared bills with Sammy Davis Jr., Tony Bennett and other stars.




Another interesting version of "Mack The Knife" by the unknown Meg Andre from 1968 on the Al Furth's AlphaPop label.

[The Jeff Gray version has been posted here two years ago]


Friday, November 29, 2019

It's a Hap-Hap-Happy Day





It's A Hap-Hap-Happy Day


Roye Dodge [dance] Studios were located at 8 Second St, New York City, owned by Roye Dodge and his wife Jayne. Roye Dodge was a well-known tap dance instructor and choreographer.

R&J Records, the studio label, released a series of records by uncredited artists designed as accompaniment for dance instruction. [See discography at discogs]


Roye and Jayne dancing in 1943




It's a Hap-Hap-Happy Day was written by cartoonist Max Fleischer's staff musicians Sammy Timberg, Winston Sharples, and Al Neiberg.  the song was featured in "Gulliver's Travels," Fleischer's animated feature film and sung by the Lilliputian villagers as they made a new suit of clothes to fit their friend and protector, Gulliver.

Tuesday, November 26, 2019

When It's Time


Mike Rogers
Nashville Jamband

JOiFU 149

When It's Time
wr. joi dibrango - fu wilson




Oddity from 1975.  Who were Joyce Di Brango and Frank Wilson, sole owners of JOiFU Records, located at 102 Hobart Street, in Utica, N.Y.? I can't find much info about them. 

Joi (Joyce Lauraine DiBrango) was born in 1944.  A 1959 newspaper tells us that she was a member of The Utica Grammar School Girls Basketball League team that wins a city “sports day” tournament  and that she was from Roosevelt School.

Even more mysterious is Fu aka Frank Edward Wilson, born in 1912.

JOiFU Records was active in the seventies and released two "Broadway Musical Show" albums and several singles recorded by 
Mike Rogers, 
Gene Marshall, 
Gene Marshall & The Clicking Flicks, 
Jim Fraser, 
Big Jim Biji (Jim Fraser?) And The Biji Roks, 
Connie Heywey And The Biji Roks
Connie Wayne and the Winchester Beegees.
Text (mixing upper and lower case) found on the back of their second album cover is a complete nonsense :

Excerpt:
This is the 2nd Broadway Musical Project by ASCAP writers/publishers and record label owners Joyce Lauraine Dibrango "joi" and Frank Edward Wilson "fu" from Utica New York. They are experienced veteran professional all music artists, Jazrok is their paramount style and Frank's stint with the Utica Civic Orchestra brought the USA National Title to that Group in the 1950's.  

"Rocking with Barbara" song 5 explains "Queen Barbara" is the real USA all Music Queen. She is Real. You may see her any day at her executive office desk. Her 1970-1980 The greatest in all time USA history. That gigantic.
 More later, hopefully...

Frank "Fu" Wilson
Broadwady ASCAP



Monday, November 18, 2019

I'll Meet You By The River


The Sheppard Singers




Show-Me 1158

Unlisted Starday Custom release out of Potosi, Missouri. From 1966.  Members included Marjorie Sheppard (1925-1999) and her father Orvil Sheppard.  The Sheppard Singers sang gospel on KYRO Radio Station and also at many churches in the Potosi area.

Sunday, November 17, 2019

Voodoo Doll


The Interiors

Worthy W-1008
Leroy Braswell, Jimmy Dockett, Junior Fry, Stanley Greggs, Bernard Newman, and Jay Otis Washington are The Interiors. 

Worthy Records and Worthy Music were located at 550 Fifth Ave., N.Y.C.  Gil (Gilbert) Snapper owned the label. He recorded on his own label as Ashley Beaumont The 18th .



Saturday, November 16, 2019

Way Out West


Mae West

Way Out West
Tower Records 2056
1966

Backing band : Somebody's Children (aka the Chyldren, aka The Off-Beats, aka The Children)
A Dagonet Production (David Mallet)

Derek Taylor* wrote in his book "As Time Goes By" [excerpt]
[...] David Mallet called me one day in Hollywood and asked me if I would like to represent Mae West. I said, oh I don't know, I'm very busy, you know how it is. He said she had made a rock'n'roll record, an album called Way Out West for Tower Records (a Capitol subsidiary which Capitol closed with an axe in the back in 1969), and she was going to need publicity on account of she had not been heard for some years.

David Mallet was then in his early twenties. He was British, living in Hollywood, and working as assistant producer to Jack Good on Shinding!, and [...] he was very enthusiastic and persuasive and it took him all of half a minute to persuade me to change my mind and I promised to work for Miss West.

He warned me there was much to be done. "She is a very fussy old lady," he said, "but you mustn't ever use the word "old" in her presence.  She would be very cross, very cross indeed." [...]

*Derek Taylor was The Beatles’ Press Officer in 1964 and the Apple Press Officer between 1968 and 1970. Between times he represented many acts including The Beach Boys and The Byrds. He continued to work with The Beatles in the 1980s and 1990s,


Shakin' All Over


Wednesday, November 13, 2019

Change Your Mind




Change Your Mind



A Man Only Does

This is a second issue, probably from 1964, released on the Beacon's Joe Davis label.  The record was previously issued on Hudco, a label owned by Joe Davis' wife, Bertha Davis.



 
Hallique
(Hallique Foster Henry 1919-2006)

Described by a 1944 article as an Harlem beauty, Hallique was known because of her extensive travelling with her husband, Haywood Henry, sax player with Erskine Hawkins orchestra, According to the same article "She operates one of New Yorks's finest fashion marts known as Hallique's Fashion Shoppe and is recognixed as a fashion stylist of rare distinction."

She recorded only sporidically. There was a single for Clock in 1960 and another on Joe Davis in 1966 (See 45cat)

In the late sixties, she operated Que Records, which issued several adult comedy albums, perhaps recycling old Joe Davis masters. See Discogs

 

Tuesday, November 12, 2019

Cactus

Legendary Stardust Cowboy

While a student at Lubbock’s Monterey High School in the mid-sixties, Norman Carl Odam, the only son of Utahonna Beauchamp, a clerk at J. C. Penney’s, and Carl Bunyan Odam, an auto mechanic, would stand on the school steps and bang on an old guitar (using only the G7 chord, according to Ely). Often, suited up in his Ledge outfit, he’d tool into fast-food drive-ins in a light blue Chevy Biscayne with “NASA presents the Stardust Cowboy” spray-painted on the side, hop on top of the car, and start his show. The kids would rearrange their cars to face him. Some would cheer him on, others would pelt him with Sweetarts or clumps of dirt, then invariably—before he could demonstrate his skills on the bugle and the washboard—fights would start and he’d have to peel out.  (from Texas Monthly, June 2000)



Monday, November 11, 2019

Five Years


Tony Dodge



Five Years

Marvin Silverman-Hardy Salwitz
Michele Music ASCAP
   Arranged and conducted by Hardy Salwitz

Square Records 45-S101
1960

Tony Dodge, real name Alan Mark David, born in 1928 in New York City. David’s father worked for the New York Press.  Well, not exactly.  Essentially, he was a presser in New York’s Garment Center.  But, when asked what his father did for a living, he always said he was with the New York Press.  Of course, his mother was a housewife, no self-respecting woman worked outside of the home in those days.  The family moved to Bensonhurst, Brooklyn in 1935.

A Korean War Veteran, Alan David was with the United Service Organization and an entertainer in New York, City & Suburban Night Clubs.  Joined the Dr. Scholl Company in 1954.

Owner of Square Records was Marvin Silverman.

Artists on the Square label (1960-1962) : Joanne Carter, Bobby Reno, Bobby Lance, Dave Zaval, Johnny Crear, Alfred Rage, Renee Matthews, The Axcents, Matt Cord and Lee Randy

Saturday, November 9, 2019

I Wanna Hold Your Hair





Yeah, Yeah, Yeah, Yeah (Yeah, Yeah, Yeah)

Warner Bros. 5420   
March 1964


Larry Orenstein, probably the man behind The Bagels (did he also sing?) wrote both songs, which were published by Leeway Music (ASCAP) owned by his old friend Hal Levy.

Larry Orenstein [1918-2006]
A jazz trumpeter and singer, played trumpet for the Paul Whiteman and Orchestra (as "Larry Neill"), then performing solely as a vocalist with the orchestra of bandleader Shep Fields. In addition to his work with other bands, such as that of Ray Noble, he kept busy as a sideman for radio variety shows.

In 1955 he was hired on to The Donald O'Connor Show (1954) as a songwriter, and later wrote songs for (and had a small part in) an episode of I Love Lucy (1951) called "Lucy Goes to Scotland". In 1956 he was hired by Sidney Miller, with whom he had worked on "The Donald O'Connor Show", to write songs for The Mickey Mouse Club (1955), for which Miller was a director. In addition to writing music, Orenstein also came up with storylines for several episodes. He left the show at the end of the season. He freelanced as a songwriter for television (he wrote the theme song for Bachelor Father (1957) and stage. In the 1970s he started his own advertising agency, and among his clients were among others Sony, Pioneer and McDonalds.

He died of pneumonia on February 22, 2006, in Sherman Oaks, California.

Friday, November 8, 2019

Blow Top Blues


Donna Drake



Blow Top Blues

From the album "Donna Sings Dinah" featuring the Wynton Kelly Trio (Alma Records, 1968), Redd Foxx introduces Miss Donna Drake.

Info from the LP's back cover:
Since the Queen's passing, Redd Foxx has seen and heard dozens of new voices and faces in the many clubs he works, but none that compared to the great Dinah Washington, that is, until he heard Donna Drake.  Since that first listen, Redd has been determined to let the World hear her too.  That determination led to the making of [the] album
Donna Drake was born in Wheeling, West Virginia and come to Detroit at age 3.  The oldest child of four children, she attended Detroit's Northern High chool where she first sang with the school choir and participated in variety show with such school chums as Paul Chambers, Donald Byrd and Barry Harris. After winning a Windsor, Ontario, talent contest, she received a contract for a television show. (...) She worked for a while with the late great Charlie Parker till the time of his death.  After that, a tour of the East and Midwest and parts of Canada, and then a supporting singer for such stars as Gloria Lynn, Betty Carter, Brook Benton and Joe Williams.  Donna's meeting with Redd Foxx took place while he was appearing at Detroit's Charade Club.  Backing Donna is the Wynton Kelly Trio, the same group who for so many years backed Dinah Washington.

Thursday, November 7, 2019

Mama, Forgive Your Truckin' Man




Mama, Forgive Your Truckin' Man

From Manchester, Pennsylvania, here is Edna Mae Henning (born in 1941) on her own Henning Surprise label. According to waxidermy, she wrote over 10,000 songs. 

Discography (all on Henning Surprise, late 70s and 80s)

VMRFP-1164   (1978)
Mama, Forgive Your Truckin' Man    
Humming A Country Song    
Tune In Your C.B.
If You See My Baby

HSR 345
He Left Me
Give Me Time To Cry

HSR 001
I Can't Get Over You    
You're The Reason

NRF-45-289 (PS)   1980
It's Love, Love, Love    
Walking And Talking Over You

NRF-388
Please Mr. Dee-Jay
Getting The Blues Over You

SR-72188
Someday Darling    
Your Baby Wait's At Home

NRF-45-101 (PS)
Doggone It You Slipped And Gone    
Me And My Piano    
I'm Gonna Play This Ole Piano (No. 2)    
Come Back And Try Me One More Time

Saturday, November 2, 2019

Endless Sleep



Pat Stanley & The Lancers

Duel 3710

Covers of Jody Reynolds and The Crescendos by Pat Stanley about who I know nothing. And this release seems to be the only one of this Duel label? Date is also unkown (mid-sixties?)

Fort Worth, Texas record, produced by Mike Dooley, who had managed and produced Nick Kithas (aka The Creep) and Eddie James and the Ambers, both issued on Homer Lee Sewell's Oakridge Records.



Endless Sleep


Oh Julie

Sunday, September 29, 2019

Three Cherries


Arnie & Chisé Trio

Three Cherries

 T. Hoshino, H. Hamaguchi (Shinko Music)




This is Arnie Derksen and Chisé Suzuki, his Japanese wife.  According to Fort launderdale News night club editor Pat Brown "Chise's English seems to be getting more fractured with each return engagement."
Arnie Derksen was on the country music scene in the late 1950s. His roots go back to Northern Canada.  He started his musical journey in Winnipeg where was featured at the "Rancho Don Carlos", one of the largest night spots in middle Canada at that time. He had four singles released by Decca in the USA in 1958-1959. See 45cat


Chisé Suzuki

Friday, September 27, 2019

Shake His Hand



Peanut Faircloth
with The Log Cabin Boys



Shake His Hand
(Religious adaptation of "Shake A Hand")

1954


Charlie Raiford “Peanut” Faircloth Sr,
1927-2010

Born in Mitchell Country, Georgia, Charlie Faircloth had childhood polio which stunted his growth at 4’8.” This led to his nickname, “Peanut.”

He began his radio career at WNEX in Macon in 1946. While there, he also performed in a trio with future Hall of Fame members Boudleaux & Felice Bryant. His 1948-49 WNEX radio program, The Hoedown Party, was carried nationally via the Mutual Broadcasting System.

Country superstar Ernest Tubb heard him, brought him to Nashville and took him to Decca Records. Faircloth made his initial disc impact with a cover of Moon Mullican’s “I’ll Sail My Ship Alone” in 1950. Other Decca singles included “Mississippi River Blues” and “Coffee, Cigarettes and Tears.”

More....


Vote For Me For President My Name Is Buddy Max


Buddy Max
The Singing Roller Skating Cowboy


Vote For Me For President My Name Is Buddy Max

Cowboy Junction
Hwy, 44 West, Lecanto, Florida 32661









Besides being a flea market manager, skating rink proprietor and recording artist, Buddy Max is an actor. In one corner of his land, he built a small amphitheater where, from 1969 to 1974, Buddy and his wife Freda portrayed Adam and Eve. Their son, Johnny, was cast as the Cherub who chased them from the Garden of Eden. They all wore flesh-colored leotards.

"I pulled a string -- you couldn't see the string -- and the rib came up," said Buddy, whose real name is Boris Max Pastuch. "It was actually a religious play, see."


Billboard Spotlight, September 27, 1997


Thursday, September 26, 2019

I Ain't Changin'


Jamie Marlowe





Florida, from 1970 (or early 1971).   A Product of Hyperbolic/Hit Records International located at 548 NE 42nd St., Ft. Lauderdale.  Not listed in this discography
 






Sunday, September 22, 2019

Nature Boy


Tony Randall

Nature Boy




From his first album (on Imperial Records), issued back when he was a supporting actor in film comedies and sitcoms. Later best known for talk and game show appearances.  

“Nature Boy” penned by eden ahbez belongs to no category and perhaps should not be described at all. Randall claims to have no memory of recording it.

Recorded in August 1959 in New York City under the superivion of Henri Rene; arranged & conducted by Bernard Green (of the Mr. Peeper's Show). Issued early 1960.


Saturday, September 21, 2019

Teen Age Bop


O-Shoo-Bla-D  (Teen Age Bop)



Susan Cabot worked by day as illustrator of children's books in New York when she was spotted one evening by Max Arnow, casting director for Columbia Pictures at Manhattan’s Village Barn where she supplemented her income by working as a singer.

"Teen Age Bop" is from "Carnival Rock", a Roger Corman movie from 1957.
Susan Cabot is second only to Beverly Garland when it comes to Roger Corman's leading exploitation queens.  Cabot graced many Corman quickies in the '50s including such cheapie favorites as The Sage of The Viking Women and their Voyage to the Waters of the Great Sea Serpent (1957).  War of the Satellites (1958), and the title role in The Wasp Woman (1959). Other memorable Cabot-Corman films include Sorority Girl (1957) and Machine-Gun Kelly (1958) [source: Fangoria]



Tuesday, September 17, 2019

Candy Kisses


Leishia Brodie




Candy Kisses

Dale Records DA-101
Texas, 1966

Monday, September 16, 2019

O Dio Mio


Mona Robbins

O Dio Mio

Hoffman-Manning, Topper ASCAP



1960 cover of Annette (Buena Vista Records)

Tuesday, September 10, 2019

Monday, August 19, 2019

Tell Me Whad't I Say


Roger Rudy And The Pyramid



Tell Me Whad't I Say


Travelin' Band


According to Gary Myers
Roger Rudy of Wisconsin placed his records on jukeboxes and sold them at his mostly weekend gigs, usually within a 100-mile radius of home. Rudy started the band in 1968 and kept it going for 25 years. The Pyramids played live from the Empire Cafe in Chippewa Falls on WAXX radio in 1969, and from the Long Branch Bar in Black River Falls in 1972-73. Rudy first played piano and accordion as a child and, while living in Sacramento, CA in 1961, he played in his brother’s band there. Rudy left the music business in 1993 and opened the Bay Street Coin Shop in Chippewa Falls.

Sunday, August 4, 2019

Scatterbrain


Louise Tobin
with Orchestra conducted by Peanuts Hucko

Avant Garde #104
1965/1966



Scatterbrain

Louise Tobin has previously recorded this song in 1939 with Benny Goodman and his orchestra in September 1939.  You can listen to the 1939 version here

After a long hiatus spent raising her two boys, Tobin accepted an invitation from jazz critic and publisher George Simon to sing at the 1962 Newport Jazz Festival, where she met her future husband, clarinetist Peanuts Hucko.  They both recorded for the Vanguard Music's subsidiary Avant Garde Records, one of the "great unsung Christian psych" labels active between the years 1966 and 1972.

 







Mary Louise Tobin (born November 11, 1918) appeared with Benny Goodman, Bobby Hackett, Will Bradley, and Jack Jenney. Tobin introduced I Didn't Know What Time It Was with Benny Goodman’s band in 1939. Her biggest hit with Goodman was There'll Be Some Changes Made, which was number two on the Hit Parade in 1941 for 15 weeks. Tobin was the first wife of trumpeter and bandleader Harry James.

Swing-era singer Louise Tobin celebrated her 100th birthday party early, in Octobre 2018.

Saturday, August 3, 2019

The Church Bells Ring


Sterling Harrison




The Church Bells Ring


 

The King of The Wobble


Wednesday, July 10, 2019

Another Cup of Your Sugar





Another Cup of Your Sugar


Barry Tiffin is probably best known for "Candy Bars for Elvis", a recitation number; here he is on hiw own Sugar Records, out of Nashville, produced by Troy Shondell in 1970.

Thanks to Doug Firebaugh, who had an album produced by Barry Tiffin, I can bring to light some details about the man : 
The underbelly of Music City harbors countless hustlers and hucksters parlaying real or imagined music industry connections into “services” offered for a price to dreamers with a few bucks to squander. Often a grey area between sincere and scam, Barry Tiffin had just such a racket, but his father’s illness brought him home to Roanoke. A classified ad placed in a 1975 High Point, North Carolina newspaper reveals the angle: “For an appointment and additional information concerning the Professional Music Services of Tiffin Music Enterprises International, of Nashville, Tenn., please contact our office suite at the Ramada Inn in Roanoke, VA.”

Twenty-year-old Doug Firebaugh was referred through a mutual friend to Tiffin, but he entered the arrangement with eyes open. “We had an attorney involved in this,” recalled Firebaugh. Money was paid to have Tiffin to produce an album and contact record labels on the artist’s behalf. Three solid days in Roanoke’s K.A. studio resulted in an unadorned document of Firebaugh’s autodidactic style of songwriting. Firebaugh plays both piano and guitar throughout, with the only addition being an unnamed Nashville pedal steel player who drove six hours for the session before turning around going home. The clip-art cover of the resultant LP positions Tiffin’s Sugar Records imprint far more prominently than the artist’s name.
Also, an article from The Bee from Danville, Virginia (July 3, 1975) related:
Supervisors in Botetourt County may have succeeded in silencing a bigger-than-Woodstock rock concert planned for this historic Western Virginia community in September. the promoter had claimed the Sept. 19-21 weekend concert would draw 800,000 spectators and gross $20 million. Promoter Barry Tiffin said Wednesday he has all but given up on going through with promoting the three-day rock performance which he believes would have outdrawn the now famous Woodstock concert. Tiffin made the statement in the wake of an emergency ordinance quietly adopted by the board of supervisors May 21. He said the ordinance makes Refugees Get Senior the concert an impossibility. Tiffin, who promoted a concert at the Roanoke Civic Center last week, said he worked on plans for the Botetourt County rock festival for 18 months.
But Board Chairman Harold Wilhelm said Tiffin never approached him about the concert, and that he has never seen the promoter. He said the emergency ordinance was not directed at Tiffin's proposed concert; that the supervisors had been working on an ordinance regulatning outdoor musicals for some time

Not surprisingly, Barry Tiffin is one the Candidates For Immortality listed by Irwin Chusid in his book "Songs In The Key Of Z"